As a child, my primary school librarian taught me not how to read, but how to clock whether or not I was ready to read a book. The tactic, simple yet crucial (or so I thought at the time), saw me opening to a random page, reading a bit, and pointing out every word I didn’t know. If I reached five or more before I flipped to the next set of pages, it was bound to be too advanced for my age. I’m not sure how effective this was in terms of longevity – not every human, young or otherwise, can possibly know the meaning of every word they come across – but the point was that attempting to absorb something that you repeatedly struggled to grasp was futile. As I aged, this strategy evolved into one that can stretch across all mediums: The practice of sussing out a vibe, noting whether or not the work in question was of real interest, and realizing when it’s okay to put it down, to not persist in consuming something that didn’t stimulate. This developed exercise is something I’ve carried with me for decades. With books, I’m occasionally willing to press on, but I’m also cognizant of when my curiosity has waned or hasn’t been satisfied; it’s different with movies, given my profession, and I’m far more prone to push through a lack of intrigue in order to, simply put, make sense of the entire picture.
Admittedly, it’s easiest to suss out what a viewer is getting themselves into when a film telegraphs its intentions from the jump. Better yet, it’s frequently most exciting when a film bares all of its stylistic ambitions from the moment its images begin to populate the screen. No one wants the full story beaten into them within a matter of minutes, but the sooner a film is intentional about communicating its vibe, if you will, the sooner a blind audience might be able to recognize that it’s already on its wavelength, or can jump on before it passes them by. The wonkier the better, in many cases.
Which brings us to Gala del Sol’s Rains Over Babel, perhaps the “wonkiest” premiere to have been screened at this year’s Sundance Film Festival so far, and the easiest to get on board with from the jump, as far as this critic is concerned. del Sol’s feature debut begins in an eclectic apartment belonging to Erato (Sofia Buenaventura) and “el boticario,” or “the Apothecary,” (Santiago Pineda), with the occupants/lovers describing their relationship with one another – and their surroundings – in ambiguous detail. Erato says that her husband is beginning his morning by “selecting the Shadows he’ll work with during the day,” a practice that matches Pineda’s garb, a thin, unbuttoned shirt, dangly earrings, rings on more than half of his fingers, and nails painted black to go with his eyeliner. When it’s his turn to provide us with some exposition, the Apothecary turns to the camera, a “whoosh” soundtracking the motion of his head toward the lens. He tells us that Erato grew up in a traveling circus, because of course she did; she stopped talking when she was seven, because of course she did; nobody knows why, because of course they don’t. (Immediately after this explanation, if you can call it that, Erato licks her beloved’s face, an action accompanied by the sort of noise that will sensualize some audiences and disgust those with a sensitivity to, say, their partner’s chewing.) “She’s the silent muse of this story,” the Apothecary says before shushing the audience, as if to warn us of what’s to become of us if we dare speak of her secrets, and therefore the narrative’s secrets themselves.

It’s not facts that matter to Rains Over Babel nearly as much as the riddles that drape over every sentence, every bit of dialogue, every moment, practically. It’s a film that makes sense, generally speaking, but cares far more about its own fascinating allure, not pretentiously but confidently. To be fair to it, and to del Sol by extension, it also has one hell of a premise. A delirious and clever riff on Dante’s “Inferno,” Rains Over Babel primarily unfolds inside the confines of a dive bar – the titular “Babel” – that maintains a legendary existence in the film’s central Colombian city. del Sol’s beautifully-diversified cast of characters, all queer in one way or another, gather at their local haunt and attempt to avoid contact with the devil herself; just another day for a group of 20-somethings. Known as “La Flaca” (played demonically yet elegantly by Saray Rebolledo), she is their Colombian city’s grim reaper, and the bar, which doubles as a purgatory for all thee who enter, is her home. As her demons come into contact with an onslaught of drag queens, the film swerves even further into the leftest of fields, a thrilling result for the most curious viewer.
No sooner than it places its elaborate narrative and aesthetic objectives on a pedestal does it become abundantly clear that Rains Over Babel is bound to be an ensemble piece, the story’s aforementioned multifarious company stretching far beyond the guides who were introduced first. Dante (Felipe Aguilar Rodríguez), the protagonist (insofar as the film has one), has been La Flaca’s soul-collecting minion for longer than he cares to remember, an unironically soul-crushing duty that has left him feeling emptier with every passing mission. But Dante’s hellish responsibilities are coming to a close just as we witness him encounter some of del Sol’s most fascinating inventions, from a dead poet named Monet (Johan Zapata) to the closeted pastor’s son whose drag name is Darla Experiment (Jhon Bayron Quintero Valencia). That each creation is in direct service of Babel’s batshit mission statement makes the film that more intriguing; that it all but goes off the rails entirely is part of its charm, not an indictment of its cohesiveness or occasional lack thereof.

Most, if not all, of the intricately-crafted set pieces that propel del Sol’s debut forward, especially once we’ve arrived at the bar, are far too intoxicating to spoil with even the most general details – perhaps it’s even too much to say that the presence of music, even in seemingly-limited quantities, should indicate the beginning of a memorable scene. Do they sometimes feel deployed for the sake of flair and not story? Perhaps, and the behind-the-scenes work that is applied often aids that measure, with Sten Tadashi Olson’s cinematography becoming dangerously close to being the star of the show. Yet one entirely taking away from the other remains out of the question as Babel persists in its deliriousness, craft and performance strutting hand in hand as the film’s dance numbers and fights – often one and the same – worm their way into your brainstem, diffusing the efforts of logic for pleasure to make its way through. Imagine Climax by way of Suspiria with just as much emphasis on dancing as both and little to no blood, and you’re halfway there.
In a just world, Rains Over Babel would be the kind of film that receives a slew of out-of-left-field awards recognition for its technical work, sound design in particular, and not just for its over-the-top flourishes – its “whooshes” prevalent, with its “slurps” and “snarls” being just as persistent – but for the additional accented moments that most indie films with the bandwidth to do so care to highlight. They range from extravagant to simple. When a character winks, followed by a flash of their tongue, the sound mimics that of what someone might find synonymous with a splash of glitter dousing a cartoon character’s face; an apartment floods due to burst pipes, and the trickling water from a sock one of its tenants rings out onto the tile floor would be enough to drive a clean freak to the edge. It’s a masterclass in technique from Gerry Vazquez and James Parnell, the film’s sound designers, providing the film with commotion that becomes as intrinsic to the film’s story as its finest details and its even finer performances. Work of this sort is often unsung, and is oftentimes derided for being overdone; that line is toed meticulously here, and the result, much like Babel as a whole, is impossible to ignore in the best way.
Rains Over Babel had its World Premiere in the NEXT section of the 2025 Sundance Film Festival.
Director: Gala del Sol
Writer: Gala del Sol
Rated: NR
Runtime: 113m
In a just world, Rains Over Babel would be the kind of film that receives a slew of out-of-left-field awards recognition for its technical work, sound design in particular, and not just for its over-the-top flourishes – its “whooshes” prevalent, with its “slurps” and “snarls” being just as persistent – but for the additional accented moments that most indie films with the bandwidth to do so care to highlight.
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GVN Rating 7
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Will Bjarnar is a writer, critic, and video editor based in New York City. Originally from Upstate New York, and thus a member of the Greater Western New York Film Critics Association and a long-suffering Buffalo Bills fan, Will first became interested in movies when he discovered IMDb at a young age; with its help, he became a voracious list maker, poster lover, and trailer consumer. He has since turned that passion into a professional pursuit, writing for the film and entertainment sites Next Best Picture, InSession Film, Big Picture Big Sound, Film Inquiry, and, of course, Geek Vibes Nation. He spends the later months of each year editing an annual video countdown of the year’s 25 best films. You can find more of his musings on Letterboxd (willbjarnar) and on X (@bywillbjarnar).